Tarzan the Robot will swing over the heads of farmers to monitor their crops

Video Description

“A few years back, some colleagues and I were exploring ways for small, persistent monitoring robots to traverse crop fields,” he continued. “These robots had to survive and move throughout the field over long periods of time without human intervention. There was no easy solution to this problem, as wheeled robots were likely to get stuck, and flying robots typically have flight times only in the tens of minutes. So we developed [this] so-called brachiating robot, or swinging robot, that can traverse elevated wires above the plant rows. Many agricultural settings already have some type of elevated wire, or they can be easily installed. Our robot can swing along a wire, or between wires, allowing it to monitor an entire field using sensors installed between the arms.”